Thursday, August 18, 2011

"I do believe that the issue of global warming has been politicized. I think there are a substantial number or scientists who have manipulated data so that they will have dollars rolling into their projects. I think we're seeing, almost weekly or daily, scientists are coming forward and questioning the original idea that manmade global warming is what is causing the climate to change. Yes, our climate has changed. They've been changing ever since the earth was formed. But I do not buy into a group of scientists who have in some cases [been] found to be manipulating this information. ..."

Go to this link and watch the video in which Perry is asked the question to which he provides this answer. It is far more illuminating than even this quote can provide.

This is nuttiness of the tinfoil hat variety.

The scientists coming forward almost daily questioning the idea of manmade global warming do not exist. Perry might find comfort in believing that they exist, but that does not make them real. Neither are the cases of scientists manipulating data. Where are they? There may be unsubstantiated news reports of such things, but, like UFO abductions, no evidence that withstands scrutiny.

One of the conclusions that we can draw from this is that absolutely no amount of evidence can ever convince Perry that he is mistaken. What would that evidence look like? If the weight of evidence collected by the world's scientists is not enough, then he is going to hold his views regardless of the evidence.

This is one thing about science. You can believe what you want about the scientists, but they are required to put their evidence on the table and you can look at it separately.

Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot. The whole scientific community is involved in this massive conspiracy to extort money from governments with false emergencies. Except, of course, for a few scientists who are willing to report what Perry already knows to be true, who are then mercilessly and unjustly abused by the vast body of evil co-conspirators.

I can hardly wait for Perry to become President so he can hire people to rewrite scientific reports to reflect his truth - and the truths of his largest campaign contributors, of course.

This is the same thing we had with President Bush. President Bush applied it not only to global warming and evolution, but to questions like, "Does Iraq have weapons of mass destruction?" Bush used it, in other words, to start a war.

11 comments:

We've suffered here in Texas with Bush and then Perry, and now we're inflicting him upon the rest of the country. I am sincerely sorry for that. Perry exemplifies cronyism in the most blatant of ways. It's a little hysterical that he accuses scientists of doing the same. But I guess when you're that corrupt, you think everyone else is too?

"In 2009, Perry wrote EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson a letter... Perry cited leaked e-mails from British scientists that suggested that data were distorted to overstate the dangers of global warming.

"The disclosure of potentially fraudulent and criminal behavior requires that the EPA conduct an independent and public review of the science prior to implementing these findings," Perry told Jackson in the letter. "It would be unconscionable for the EPA to ignore what appear to be systematic attempts by certain scientists to achieve preordained results." Subsequent investigations by the British Parliament and the Commerce Department into the so-called Climategate e-mails found no evidence of a systematic effort to manipulate data."

Ad hominem attacks will not further your arguments. It serves no purpose in achieving greater understanding of issues.

What exactly is science telling you regarding climate change? That it is changing? Well duh!! Science can not tell you, with certainty, that x is happening or not. It can only narrow the possibilities.

There are many issues with regards to this topic that should make you pause. To use methods such as mocking and ridicule against a skeptic shows you do not have much confidence in your own positions.

What exactly is the point of your post then when you start off by calling Perry an irrational idiot? Sounds like an ad hominem attack to me.

Well, no, it is not an "ad hominem" attack to call somebody a thief, for instance, if you then provide an argument demonstrating that the proposition that the individual is a thief is true. Otherwise, all any defense attorney would ever have to do in any court of law is to assert that the claim that his client is guilty is an "ad hominem" attack and, by that fact, objectionable.

Technically, an ad hominem attack takes an irrelevant fact about a person and uses that fact as a reason to reject his arguments. Such as, "Jim is known to use drugs. Therefore, his claims about the safety of the bridge can be dismissed." Claims about the safety of the bridge are to be grounded on facts about the bridge, not facts about Jim.

Also, you make a broad generalization saying that NO climate scientist would be caught manipulating data to continue grants.

Where did I say that?

It would be absurd to make that claim. Of course there are corrupt scientists. Scientists are human beings. They have egos. There have been some well publicized cases of scientific fraud in archaeology, physics, and, most commonly, in medicine.

But the existence of a few frauds does not justify throwing out a whole body of data. We do not close down all of the hospitals and send all the patients home because some medical research company was found guilty of falsifying data (to get some drug approved by the FDA).

Furthermore, name an actual case of data manipulation in the climate change science. Certainly, it is possible. Certainly, we can imagine a scientist engaged in fraud. But Perry did not say that he could imagine fraud. He said there was fraud.

We also have Perry's college transcripts as further confirmation that he is an idiot. In science courses, he was in the C - F range and he got a D in Economics. Now, you may complain that this by itself is not conclusive, but it creates a damning picture alongside all the other evidence.

I am somewhat anxious about making too many references to Perry's college transcripts, unless there is some way to verify that they are real.

I'd hate to declare too eagerly that these are accurate only to discover that they are some photoshopped forgery (like Obama's Kenyan birth certificate).

However, having said that, I will report that I did teach college for a few years (as a graduate student teacher's assistant). A "C" pretty much means that you actually attended the course and took the tests.

A student has to pretty much drop out of the class (quit attending, take the tests without studying or not take the tests at all) to get a D or an F.

About Me

When I was in high school, I decided that I wanted to leave the world better off than it would have been if I had not existed. This started a quest, through 12 years of college and on to today, to try to discover what a "better" world consists of. I have written a book describing that journey that you can find on my website. In this blog, I will keep track of the issues I have confronted since then.